Blame Updike for the Ennui

Today my star is blinking sporadically, like a dying light bulb on and off and over again. It was on at full capacity supernova last night when, after dreaming a strange and strangely disheartening dream (I dreamed of being bored, can you freaking believe that? What a waste of unconsciousness! I'm reading Updike and my instinct is to blame him for this.)  And I opened my eyes to face the darkness of my cluttered bedroom and couldn't shut them again. My brain burst with all those late night musings that present themselves like jagged pieces of a broken mirror. You know the kind? The kind in which you can still see parts of your reflection but all of it looks distorted?

Hence, my slow and methodical fading away today. I swished some iced coffee around in my mouth as I rode the subway to work, hoping to clear away the bitter taste of my version of the dark night of the soul. How stupid mine have become!

There is really no difference between my thoughts in the newborn light of early morning in bed and my thoughts in the false fluorescence of daytime, apart from what I'm wearing. Well that plus the notion that everything is a just a bit wrong. Maybe not everything but just everything I've ever done, said, written or worn. And by just a bit wrong I just mean than anything that comes from my very essence, from that place that sits right at the base of my soul and identity is useless and worthless. I awkwardly jab at the notion, that maybe I share a bit too much of myself on here and on social media.

I feel connected to you in this way but I'm not sure there really is a bridge there. I feel like Indiana Jones in the Last Crusade when he's in the Temple of the Sun, standing on the edge of a cliff and not seeing a bridge there but stepping down anyway, believing he could reach the other side even though he couldn't see how. He can see it after he's already on it, after he's thrown some dirt all over it. I sometimes don't know if anyone is on the other side. And my 80s childbrain will draw parallels to Indiana Jones, as it does.

I don't really know you. Or I only know some of you. Or I've created the thing that I want you to be in my mind and assume that's how you are but I don't really know. Do you?

See? Same thoughts of a day of a night of a neurotic person. No difference whatsoever.

I spent the weekend in a house by a lake. It belongs to some friends who were kind enough to let me and my sister head up there. Originally it was going to be a whole gang of us but life is a tumble dryer sometimes and so it was just me and my sis. It was a blustery, gray weekend but the trees were still in mostly autumn splendor and though it poured down rain, being there was a recharging. I've been unable to finish the story I'm working on and, though I still didn't finish it, I made some real progress. If you make progress in a story in a house by the woods, does it make a sound?

As you can see, BEDO chugs on but the tracks are missing some rails. I've ostensibly just "blogged" by telling you that I had insomnia, drank coffee and that I have writer's block. ARE YOU NOT AMUSED?!

Spoiler alert.

On my better days...

I had forgotten all day to blog or that I was supposed to blog so I haven't been kicking around any ideas for today. Rowan arrives in t-30 minutes from LaGuardia and I'm into my first wine of the evening. So instead of waxing on about some nonsensical crap I'll just relate my favorite anecdote about John Cusack. I know it seems random to you but if you were in my living room and were in my head or if you were my sister, the continuity would hold up. So here it is:

In the movie "Almost Famous", directed by Cameron Crowe (I used to really love Cameron Crowe and I try very hard not to hold "Aloha" against him), the character Russell Hammond, lead singer of the fictional 70s band Stillwater is asked by a fan of his band, "Are you Russell Hammond?" To which he replies, "On my better days, I am Russell Hammond."
I probably got this from the extras on the "Almost Famous" DVD, but Cameron Crowe wrote that line based on a real dialogue that happened when he was hanging out with John Cusack at a bar, shortly after "Say Anything" came out. A fan approached him and asked "Are you Lloyd Dobler?" And John Cusack said "On my better days, yes, I am Lloyd Dobler."

I find that anecdote charming because I love both John Cusack and Lloyd Dobler. Also, that's my party anecdote. So now you know what to expect from me at parties.

Fin.